


Autopilot

by nivu_vu



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Anal Sex, Dubious Consent, F/M, Gangbang, M/M, Religion Kink, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Unhealthy Perspectives on Sexuality, Unhealthy Relationships, Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-11
Updated: 2019-08-11
Packaged: 2020-08-19 11:40:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20209129
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nivu_vu/pseuds/nivu_vu
Summary: Unable to find any answers needed to stop the Unknowing, Jon finds himself going to Elias repeatedly, too many times, until their arguments have an unfortunate fallout. So Jon falls. Deeper and deeper into the mess that he and Elias have created. And really, Jon knows it's his fault.(AKA JonElias but every time they JonElias Jon gets sluttier)





	1. Chapter 1

The first time Jon meets Elias Bouchard is during his interview.

The man introduces himself as the Head of the Magnus Institute (capitalization included), and Jon can only briefly consider how strange it is for the Head of the Institute himself to conduct the interview before Elias begins his questions.

He thinks much longer about how the questions seem to dig into him.

* * *

Then Elias promotes him. He doesn’t understand (he’s a researcher, not an- an archivist?), but he’s not about to turn down a promotion. The position sounds simple enough, and it has a prestige to it (_Head Archivist_) that he kinda likes. He wouldn’t say that out loud, but-

Why is Elias smiling at him.

Elias continues about the job description. Really, it’s not much. Elias just seems to be a very detail-oriented person. Jon will get help from some assistants that Elias has personally hand-picked. The Head Archivist is a very important job for a place such as The Magnus Institute. The way he goes on about it, Jon worries he may be in over his head accepting the position.

“Don’t worry,” Elias finally concludes, “You’re perfect for it.”

* * *

Jon has monthly reviews handled by Elias himself. The Head Archivist is just _t__hat _ important, apparently.

Now, Jon knows he isn’t the most laid-back of guys. He can be slow on the uptake of jokes. He doesn’t socialize often. He definitely doesn’t party. Georgie had taught him that… very well.

However, Elias acts like he’s never relaxed once in his life. Everything in his office is so neat and orderly. The papers stacked in one corner of his desk are only barely misaligned with each other. The nameplate is angled ever-so-slightly to create a controlled kilter. Elias sits in his office chair behind the exact center of his desk.

That doesn’t even begin to touch on the day-to-day interactions with Elias. Memos are sent out at exactly noon every other day. Jon wonders where Elias gets all his ideas for memos. The frequency of them makes him believe that eventually some superfluous one will come through. But no. Each one is relevant to the goings-on of the Institute, to the point that Jon wonders how Elias is able to keep on top of so much. He doesn’t appear to have any secretaries.

Hm. Perhaps this is somewhat overstepping his boundaries, but Jon has… suspicions that Elias has a fetish for administrative work.

* * *

Jon can’t admit to Elias that reading statements fills him with two feelings: 1.) frustration and 2.) exhaustion.

The stories in the statements are fantastical at best and ludicrous at worst. That’s all they ever seem to be - stories. Neither he nor his assistants have found anything that would lend even the smallest amount of credence to the statements. They’re all clearly fabrications or the ravings of a drug-addled mind, and he has half the mind to tell Elias that this is all quite pointless.

This doesn’t even begin to touch on the mess that the last Head Archivist left him.

Then there’s the tedium in reading each statement all the way through, on a tape recorder nonetheless. He thinks that’s why they seem to leave him feeling so tired afterwards. It’s been getting worse, too. His body and mind must truly be reaching the event horizon of boredom and irritation.

But he has a job to do. And Elias seems to think he’s doing a fine enough job, whatever this job may be accomplishing. 

_ Still_, he may need to discuss with Elias if there’s a better use of his time.

Jon picks up a statement about an encounter with Jane Prentiss, and his skin crawls.

He tucks that conversation with Elias away for a later time.

* * *

Maybe he's paranoid, maybe he's rightfully worried. There are too many fingers that point to Elias knowing more than he lets on. There is no way the man who is the apparent Head of the Magnus Institute would be so- so _ blind _ to all the goings-on of his establishment.

Gertrude Robinson was found dead in the tunnels, and Jon worries if he thinks too loudly, he will be next.

* * *

Looking back, it all makes sense.

Hindsight is twenty-twenty, after all.

The part of Jon that sets expectations unreachable by the tallest of giants tells him, he should’ve known. He’d known something was wrong, that there was someone in the Institute he couldn’t trust. And Elias had been on the list. Jon had been _that _ close to sussing out the truth. And for whatever reason, he’d been too stupid to actually figure it out.

He feels stupid now, sitting here - _ trapped _ \- still trusting Elias, as if there’s anything left to trust. He’s god-knows-where, subject to the whim of an insane puppet that wears humanity like a set of ill-fitted clothes. He has all these hours to think about the choices he’s made and the choices he’ll no longer be able to make, and it all cycles back to a bitter expectation that Elias can do something. 

Elias won’t possibly let him die here, right? Grabbed and prodded and fondled by a monster - by- by some _ other _ monster besides their own?

Jon finds he doesn’t really want to die, and that he’s quite angry at the prospect.

When it’s the Distortion that comes to save him, he finds he’s quite angry at Elias.

* * *

Elias is useless.

Jon taps his head against the wall behind him dully.

He’s trying to believe it. The last conversation had been convincing enough. Elias knows nothing, and he’s letting Jon be the one to get his hands dirty to figure out what to do. All Elias ever does is sit in his chair and bluffs them all to hell.

He’s good at that, though.

He’s still got Jon believing he has something under his sleeve. That he has to know more than he’s letting on.

He _ has _to know more, or that’ll mean Jon’s… reached a dead end.

Gertrude had been the only one who’d known anything.

Jon scoffs.

Probably why she’s dead.

So unless more information spontaneously arrives in his brain, he’s at a loss.

He’s got a new flat now, at least. It’s all around him, but he doesn’t quite feel he’s there - here - at the moment. Too much on his mind.

With Georgie, she’d been able to pull him out of his head a bit. She’s always been able to. He can’t believe there was a time he found that an issue. But it’s easy to make everything bad when things start to crumble.

He should visit her again, under better circumstances. Thank her for committing a felony for him.

Maybe after he stops the world from ending.

* * *

No luck again.

Gertrude had been _ far _ too good at her job, be it stopping rituals, or confounding the Eye (and anyone brave enough to step into her idea of office organization) from the pleasantries of a sensible filing system. 

Jon tries to kick the dud of a box out of the way and ends up pushing his rolling chair back instead.

Now if _ that _ isn’t a metaphor for his life.

He sighs.

It’s been four days of useless statement after useless statement. At this point, he’s probably getting _ further _ from any leads.

The Unknowing relentlessly creeps closer, and he’s sitting in a chair in a stuffy office, utterly lost.

Some Archivist he is.

He turns to chance a glance at what’s become of his office floor. It’s become more paper than floor. Boxes lay about haphazardly. He can’t even remember which have been sorted through and which have not, due in no small part to the fact that he hadn’t slept or eaten much in those four days.

Jon digs his knuckles into his eyes. If he looks at the mess anymore, he’ll give himself a migraine. Though one is probably inevitable anyways, what with the mounting hopelessness clawing at his throat.

He doesn’t know what to _ do_.

Martin and Basira have been looking into things on their own, as well, with similar results. The only living person who may have an inkling of where to look next is _ Elias_, and Jon has already found out just how helpful he can be. (Jon is suddenly aware of how smooth his skin is.) But what choice does he have at this point. 

After a moment of trying not to pass out after standing up, Jon marches up to Elias’s office.

He opens the door without knocking. Whatever meeting Elias could be having is the least of Jon’s concerns.

It turns out that Elias is calmly doing paperwork at his desk, not bothering to even look up at Jon.

(The thought flits across Jon’s mind that it’s Wednesday. He’s probably doing the schedule.)

“Jon,” Elias says, putting his pen down as Jon approaches him.

“Where am I supposed to be looking? Or- or, what am I supposed to be looking _ for_?”

Elias frowns and shifts in his seat. “We’ve discussed this.”

“Yes, yes.” Jon rolls his eyes. “You need me to grow into my role as the Archivist or something. I don’t think we have time for that right now. There’re no leads - anywhere. Gertrude’s cleaned up her trail too well, and none of us have been able to find anything.”

“Look harder,” Elias says.

“_Look harder_. Is that the best advice you can give?”

Elias sighs. Jon doesn’t like the way he does so. It’s a long drag that looks too much like Elias is attempting to contain an outburst. Jon may be pushing his luck.

Elias says, “Gertrude had done her best to prevent the Eye from being able to know any of her plans. I’m sure you’re very aware of this. If the Eye can’t reach it, then _ I _ can’t. I’m entrusting you with the responsibility of finding what we need.”

He levels a gaze at Jon that Jon can’t meet. His eyes are dark and ask too much, and Jon needs to leave after that.

* * *

Research continues as splendidly as it has been - awfully and infuriatingly. Boxes and boxes of sorted statements. The boxes pile upon each other in Jon’s office now, creating unstable towers that he’s sure will take him down within the next week.

He doesn’t know why he just took Elias’s words and left. All Elias does is lie and manipulate. Jon should have taken his words with a grain of salt, but he’s saltless, because Elias is _ good _ at those two things. And the idea that Jon is, actually, the only one who can do this sinks its fangs uncomfortably into his flesh.

He’s not doing this alone, though. He has Martin and Basira. He needs them to help him.

It feels disappointing to admit that, but...he really does need them.

He can’t let Elias isolate him.

* * *

Jon gets frustrated enough one day that he makes his way back up to Elias’s office to yell at him some more. It plays out almost exactly the same. Jon needles Elias for answers, and Elias appears uncomfortable; Elias reassures Jon that he needs to do this himself, and Jon is taken out of himself long enough that he loses his resolve.

Then Jon comes back down to his office and wallows in his confusion and self-flagellation for letting himself be shuffled away like that.

It goes on like that.

Research goes nowhere.

Jon gets angry enough to shout at Elias.

Jon ends up holing himself in his office doing pointless research feeling strange and disappointed.

Rinse and repeat.

He gets angrier each time, though, and wonders when his breaking point will be. Elias, somehow, manages the same level of mild annoyance each time. Maybe that’s an avatar thing. Elias had cast away all human emotions, save for the ones involved in looking down on people.

That wouldn’t surprise Jon honestly.

What a prick.

Jon sighs.

Even being bitter and petty has gotten exhausting. The miles-high wall that Gertrude has built for them has taken no dents. Jon would think that each box set aside would at least be a small chip in it, but no. There are plenty more boxes to go through, plenty more statements to follow up. The only idea that Jon has at the moment is that Gertrude had taken her trail internationally, which would be far more of a hassle to follow up on. He’s not sure, exactly, how much of a wanted criminal he still is. Or how trapped Basira is in the Institute. She strangely seems to enjoy being here, whatever that may imply.

He’ll have to ask Martin, then.

Jon leaves late each day, later than he used to, which was already astonishingly late. It’ll take a toll on him eventually. He just hopes that payment is due _ after _ he’s already stopped the Unknowing.

He leaves late today, scrubbing at his eyes, a statement packed away in his bag so he can maybe take a look at it before he sleeps.

He’s determined. He hopes that doesn’t get him killed.

* * *

“Have you done _ anything _ \- anything at _ all _ \- besides sit behind that desk?!”

Elias takes a long, deep breath. “This again?”

Jon slams his hands on Elias’s stupid desk. If it weren’t there, he’d- he’d- he doesn’t know. He’d do something! “Yes, this again. It’s always this. It’s always you sending me to do something that neither you nor I know the reason for. It’s always you sitting back and letting me do all the work - you, making me put together all the pieces for you because you’ll never be able to figure anything out by yourself.”

“Jon,” Elias warns. He stands up, as if that’ll intimidate Jon at this point.

They’ve had this argument too many times, too many ways, for Jon to really give a damn anymore. If Elias is going to off him, well, at least here Jon will see it coming. At least he won’t die in some other country, alone, with only Elias’s vaguest instructions pointing him blindly in the direction of Schrodinger’s answers.

No, all Jon cares about right now is just how far he can push Elias. One last, petty satisfaction before he dies.

He leans forward. “Is that all you have to say?”

Elias lays his hands on the desk and matches Jon’s posture. Their faces are inches apart, and Jon can’t tear his eyes away from Elias’s.

He can’t - he _ can’t_.

“All you can do is watch,” Jon pushes. “You’re useless.”

Elias walks calmly around his desk, and Jon still _ can’t _-

“Why do you even need me, if you’re such a loyal, faithful servant of the Eye?”

He’s being backed up towards the wall. 

“Why don’t you have the powers to do anything? Why do you have to rely on me?”

“_Jon_, are you even aware of what you’re doing?”

Jon’s crashes into the wall behind him and spits back as unsteadily as he feels, “You don’t get to say that to me. You don’t get to pretend you’ve ever known what you were doing. Or that you’ve ever even- Would you- would you _ do _ something for once?”

Besides cast question after question out, casting Jon along with them, hoping maybe one pond will have answers, when more than half don’t.

Funny how Elias serves an entity of knowledge, but he can’t answer _ one _ question.

Elias looks down at him; they’re too close again, eyes locked yet. 

Bastard. Just-

“_Answer me_.”

There’s a loud slam to Jon’s left, then Elias’s lips are on his, and any confusion he may have is lost in the breath Elias steals from him. A thumb slides into the hollow under his jaw, and he lets Elias into his mouth as he lets his own hands slide up Elias’s chest.

It’s easy, too easy, the way Jon lights up at letting Elias in, at Elias letting him in. Elias, for all his barriers and facades, is here, under Jon’s touch, revealing a vulnerability that Jon starts to lose himself in, too vulnerable himself. He’s intoxicated by the very notion that Elias is here, present in a way he can’t have been for many others, if anyone at all. Jon selfishly devours all the bits of himself that Elias feeds him. How he sighs more than breathes, how quietly his voice falls out, how rough his fingertips are against Jon’s skin.

Jon takes all this and finds that he hates Elias. He knows, suddenly, too much and still too little.

(The human heat of his mouth, the perfect fit of his palm on Jon’s throat, the weakness he’s instilled in Jon-)

Elias slides his hand from Jon’s neck up to the back of his head, tugging his hair; other hand snaking around Jon’s waist, bringing their chests flushed.

(-the human beat of his heart, the perfect asynchrony of their lungs, the weakness he’s undoubtedly revealed to Jon-)

He shoves a thigh between Jon’s legs, and Jon’s halfway to rutting against it when he remembers himself enough to push Elias away. Never mind the fact that he was pulling him closer only the moment before.

Jon doesn’t even catch his breath before he forces his eyes to the floor and bolts.

(-they all burn and burn and burn and Jon can’t extinguish them.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we go.....
> 
> JonElias but every time they JonElias Jon gets sluttier
> 
> Specific warnings for chapters will go in these End Notes!! (Specific warnings for this chapter: Jon is a miserable little shit)
> 
> Shout out to Sajwho who's my artist for the Big Bang and has been helping me plot this and read over this so many.... many times....
> 
> It's.... gonna be a long ride....


	2. Chapter 2

Jon forces his eyes onto the words in his book. He’d given up actually trying to read it a while ago. Now, he just hopes that keeping his face down will prevent anyone from looking too closely at him. He can’t handle other people’s eyes right now. He knows he’ll see Elias watching him through them.

It’s like he never broke eye contact.

He couldn’t - he still can’t.

The walk the rest of the way to his flat is blissfully quiet. No people. No eyes. 

But he’s being watched. He knows he is. His immediate fear is that something is here for him again. If not the Stranger, then there are plenty of other monsters who may want his head. And he’s only able to learn _ what _ is watching from the cloying - and he’s loathe to admit this - _ comfort _it wraps him in.

He’s barely shut his front door behind him before he’s on the ground, shaking. The Eye had stopped following him at the door. Whatever mercy an entity of fear may have is apparently reserved for one of its favorite acolytes having a breakdown. Never mind that this breakdown is all tied back to the Eye in the first place.

Jon’s good at pushing things out of his mind. He’s good at focusing on what needs to be done, and worrying about other things later - or never at all. 

But he can’t now.

He can still feel Elias on him, worse - _ taste _ Elias on him. It leaves him wanting to tear out his tongue and to throw up in the hopes that the acid in his stomach will burn off all traces of Elias remaining on him. But Jon can’t even manage the feeling of nausea, not with the uncomfortable heat that contorts chest. 

But he’s home now. 

He looks around and scoffs at the thought. It’s hardly lived in, a couple weeks at most. A couple days, if he counted the time he actually spent here.

There are cobwebs in the untouched corners of the ceiling, and Jon wrinkles his nose at them in disgust. He can hear the Web laughing at him and his distress over- over-

He gets up and drops his bag somewhere on the floor; he’ll find it in the morning. He needs to sleep this off. Whatever claw Elias dug into his mind - he needs to sleep this off.

* * *

It’d taken him hours to fall asleep, energy entirely diverted to thinking of nothing. Absolutely nothing. It’s a lot more difficult than it sounds.

He comes in to work late, not that he cares much about time cards anymore. It’s more habit at this point, and the anxiety of missing valuable research time. He still doesn’t know how he’s going to go about stopping the Unknowing.

(There’s a lot of things he’d rather _ unknow _ right now.)

It's not like he got any help yesterday from-

He stops himself there.

Jon grabs a cup of cheap coffee from the break room and heads down to the Archives. He’s able to lose himself in the bitter, dirt taste and the jumble of statements he pulled from an unmarked box. The irritation he has at Gertrude’s awful organization helps, too. Eventually, he finds a statement that pulls at him, one about the Stranger, and he records that.

As soon as the tape recorder clicks off, he gets an email notification on his phone. He’d been extremely grateful at the time to Sasha for setting it up for him. It’d made Elias’s memos much easier to manage. No more calls jarring him from his statements asking him where he was and why wasn’t he at the meeting.

Now, as he sees Elias’s name at the top of the notification, he scowls, that strange heat beginning to coil between his ribs again. The start of the email says something about requesting a meeting, the rest needing him to unlock his phone to view. Jon puts his phone on silent and leaves it on his desk as he goes to search for more useful statements. The last one hadn’t been very enlightening.

He doubts the one he just pulled is going to be either.

Back at his desk, he sees two missed calls from Elias. Jon turns off his phone then and throws everything he’s got into the statements.

It works.

Too well.

It works so well that he doesn’t remember himself until someone knocks on his door, pulling him from his dive.

Jon stumbles to the door to find a blurry Martin.

“Oh, you’re still here,” he says to Jon, worry creasing his eyebrows.

Jon blinks his dry eyes, and Martin’s image becomes a bit crisper. “Yes, I’ve a lot to learn still if we’re to have any hope to… you know.”

“It’s rather late, Jon. I just saw the light in your office and-”

“Right, right.”

“Everyone else has gone home, but I had to check on you, because… you look a little…”

“Tired?” Jon snaps. “Trying to find a way to stop the end of the world _ does _ have a tendency to drain the life from a person.”

Martin shifts on his feet. “...Right. Please go home soon, Jon.”

“I will.”

Jon closes the door, and makes his way back to his desk to pore over some more statements.

He falls asleep there.

* * *

The sun is turning the morning a luminescent grey when Jon stumbles out of the Institute, a dusty box of statements in his arms. Research will have to occur at home today. The Institute has begun to feel suffocating, to say the least. That is, he can’t sleep with the damn Eye on him.

He can’t sleep too close to - he grits his teeth.

Jon lugs the box all the way to his flat, finally letting it drop on the floor as he kicks his front door closed behind him. A fine cloud of ancient air spouts from the box, catching in the muggy morning light. He’ll probably get some complaints from his neighbors downstairs for a 7A.M. disturbance, if his neighbors even know he lives here.

“I’m trying to save the world,” he says bitterly to the settling dust.

Coffee first, his mind supplies. 

Mug in hand, he sits down next to his box. He reaches in blindly and pulls out a stack. Parsing through statements is easier nowadays. Words pop from the paper, telling him early on to set this aside, that one too, keep this one, toss that one.

There are two neat piles sitting on either side of him by the time he’s done. The pile he _ actually _ cares about is maybe three deep, because _ of course _ \- this was never going to be easy. There’s no Google (“That’s Bing, Jon,” Tim had said. “You’re using fucking _ Bing_.”) for the obfuscation that Gertrude had concocted.

All in all, It takes three coffees for three statements, which was probably a bad idea for many reasons. He can’t remember those reasons right now, not while his finger twitches on the STOP tab of his tape recorder and half of his internal organs prepare to give out from exhaustion.

“End recording,” he says - he hopes that’s what he said, and promptly collapses.

He wakes up long after the sun has gone down. An entire day wasted again, as the statements come back to him, and he realizes that none of them had proven fruitful.

It’s useless.

Reading statement after statement has done nothing but drain him. And each statement takes too long to record (why he even does that in his lonesome, he doesn’t know). No one’s guiding him in the vaguest of directions. Gertrude surely wasn’t. Her method of organization, if it could even be called that, probably serves the Stranger itself with how badly Jon Does Not Know.

He’s so _ tired_.

And trying to turn to Elias had-

Jon swallows and sits up slowly, not that that stops his head from swirling around its cage. His whole body seems to rock along heavy waves with each breath. And through the fog of exhaustion, that heat comes crawling back into his lungs. It mingles seamlessly with the weight that burdens the rest of his body.

How very Elias, to come at him in his weakness - he can’t fight the warmth as it spreads up to his cheeks and down to his stomach.

And he’s forced to remember: Elias had kissed him, and - this thought knots that warmth deep - Jon had kissed him back.

It’s ludicrous to reduce what had happened to what sounds like a schoolyard encounter. As if Elias wasn’t a murderer. As if Elias wasn’t something inhuman.

Though it makes Jon wonder. If Elias has done something to affect him so.

He should be able to brush it off, he thinks. Of all the outlandish and bizarre things he’s dealt with during his tenure as Head Archivist, it doesn’t make any sense for something this insignificant to be what haunts him so profoundly.

He sighs.

So that’s the game Elias is playing.

Well, then Jon will just have to give Elias that meeting he’s been wanting.

* * *

“What are you doing to me?” Jon says. He stands in front of Elias’s desk, hands splayed on it, and it’s uncomfortably reminiscent.

Elias frowns. “I’m not doing anything.”

Jon’s fingers curl involuntarily against the polished wood. “Don’t play coy with me. You’re- you’re doing something with my mind.” 

Elias looks Jon in the eye levelly for a second before responding. “I had thought you’d moved beyond baselessly and arbitrarily accusing your coworkers of what you don’t even know.”

A moment of doubt flickers across Jon’s mind. No, he’s able to say, _ no_. This is Elias. The only one who’s been proven to _ have _ actually done something of suspect.

“Don’t try that,” Jon says. “You’ve been - inserting thoughts. There’s- there’s no other explanation for it.”

Elias’s face is unreadable, though Jon has never been very good with reading others’ emotions. He doesn’t respond. It bothers Jon more than it should.

“Well?” Jon pushes. “Aren’t you going to say something?”

Elias twitches. “I don’t have anything to say. You’re searching for an answer that I cannot give you in honesty.”

“You can’t expect me to believe that.”

“I don’t expect you to believe anything, Jon. You’ve only ever believed what you yourself have found as the truth, and I both admire and am frustrated by that fact.”

That now-familiar heat suddenly wraps around his throat, choking any words Jon can spit back. Elias waits, though, lets Jon have the time to swallow that heat down.

“I’ll find proof,” Jon says weakly.

“I don’t think that’ll be a productive use of your time. Not only will you find nothing that you’re looking for, but the Stranger’s ritual is approaching. I - _ we _ \- all need you to keep your focus.”

Jon can respond to that far more confidently. “You know, it’d help if you could do anything useful for once.”

Elias sighs. “I’ve already told you that I can’t hold your hand through this. You’ll never properly learn.”

Excuses, again, for the fact that Elias just wants Jon to do all his dirty work. Which means it’s time for Jon to take his leave. It’s his turn to not say anything. Just turns and goes. 

But something about Elias’s words nags at him, and later, as he tries to sleep decently for the first time in the last few days, (as he’s _ unable _ to sleep for the singular thought that plays again and again in his head,) he realizes he’s made a mistake.

* * *

Jon’s trying. He’s _ really _ trying, but there doesn’t seem to be an effective mode of distraction anymore.

He _ knows _ now, that Elias is doing something.

It’s been quite a few days since their last discussion, and each day has only gotten progressively more difficult.

Elias Bouchard. Head of the Magnus Institute. Smug snake of a man.

Jon has never hated anyone more. And it's not just because Elias can't give him a straight answer to save either of their lives. It's not just because Elias is a cold-blooded murderer. And it's not just because Elias deserves a sexual harassment lawsuit after last week.

It's because the bastard is the most obstinate, obvious, obnoxious, _ some other "ob"-word _ asshole to have ever crossed Jon's path. _ Clearly_, Elias must be doing something - Jon can't go a few hours without thinking about what happened.

Jon will finish recording a statement, and his thoughts will immediately flicker back to Elias's office. He'll be on the way to work, unable to focus on reading his book on the tube. He'll be eating. He'll be showering. He'll be tying his goddamn shoes, and Elias - _ Elias _ \- will be on his mind.

The worst time of the day, however, is undoubtedly before Jon falls asleep. Whether they’re nights in his own bed, or the ones spent hunched over a statement at his desk, as soon as his head grows drowsy, Elias comes into his thoughts. Exhausted, he cannot fight back the memory.

Often, he lays awake in bed, the memory is brief, tracking only the last few minutes of the encounter. But it hits him repeatedly, like a broken record jumping back to that moment ad nauseum. 

It steals his sleep, and he comes into work worse than he has in months.

It gets to the point that he’s stuttering through the start of statements, it taking _ time _ to drag him into their depths now. 

He’s stopped in the halls by Martin, Basira, and even _ Melanie _ of all people, asking him what’s wrong, or telling him he “looks like shit.” He can’t even muster up any arguments for them. He pushes past them wordlessly so he can find a statement that’ll take his mind off of Elias, hopefully for long enough that he can fall asleep. 

One day, in a sleepless haze, he stumbles to Elias’s office, nothing but accusations on his tongue. Elias unsurprisingly denies them all. And Jon is angry (Good. Anger is good. It’s better than -) until he catches himself staring at Elias’s lips, and the memory blindsides him harder than it has done yet. Jon drags himself out of there after that.

Day after day. Worse and worse. Less sleep means less energy to fight back the replay of Elias trapping him against the wall, Elias’s hands on him, Elias’s mouth on him. And as Jon lays in bed now, he can’t help but wonder, what if he had stayed. What if he hadn’t pushed Elias away and had kept drawing him in - let Elias go further-

Jon sits up abruptly, that heat inescapable now, sparking embers under his skin. Sweat beads at his temple, cold against his skin. He was only barely able to shut down that thought.

He stares hard at the dark in front of him, at the reflection of himself in the dirty mirror on the far side of the wall. He looks like some spectre, the lowlight of the moon painting him a sickly pallor. Or maybe he _ is _ that worse for wear. He certainly _ feels _ sick with this perverse fever that Elias has infected him with. Jon hadn’t really expected Elias to sink this low, to inject him with feelings of- of arousal.

That’s what it is. That heat pools in his stomach, but it bleeds lower. And it makes him imagine a world where he’d stayed in Elias’s office that day.

He shivers but doesn’t hide himself beneath the blankets for the sticky disgust that mixes with a want he hardly ever thinks about. And that want being directed at Elias - that sends another aching ripple of dissonance across his body. He _ hates _ Elias. Elias is a manipulative, murdering monster who wants to use Jon to remake the world in the image of some dark god, and he’s somehow taken that twisted obsession and implanted it in Jon, too. A basely attempt to drag Jon into the role he’s planned for him. 

Jon kneads his fingers into the edge of the covers, trying and failing to wear down at the tension prickling under every inch of him.

It’s a losing battle that takes him to sunrise.

* * *

Jon nearly has to beg Martin to leave him alone. It’s energy expended that he already doesn’t have, and maybe that makes him more irritated than he has any right to be.

He’s fine, he insists. He’s fine, he’s fine, he’s fine. And maybe he insists with too much venom that last time, because then Martin leaves. Jon sags against the doorframe of his office, too tired to process something like guilt right now.

He eventually makes it back to his chair, blacking out every few steps. He’s grateful honestly. Every moment spent in this exhausting limbo is another moment he doesn’t have to think. He doesn’t have to feel anything. His body faithfully carries itself through the motions. From the steps back to his seat, to picking up the statement and reciting the words on the page. Whether this statement has anything particularly useful is a concern for a later time. He needs the pull of a statement to fully lose himself. And _ finally_, he sleeps.

The night isn’t so easy.

He sits in bed, jittering with adrenaline. Apparently, allowing himself a drop of sleep in the wake of all this sleep_le__ssness _ had been a poor choice. He’d want a smoke, if not for the fact that the _ last _ time he’d done it near Elias’s influence, a man had ended up dead.

So he sits restless, hands squeezing at each other until they’re both blotchy and red. His mind clocks in on overdrive, all emotions dialed up, and it’s all Jon can do to not tear away at his own skin. He’s amazed his skin hasn’t burst on its own. All the _ need to_’s, _ want to_’s, _ hope for_’s, _ fear for_’s bubble rapidly in succession on every nerve. 

More research, more statements, more time, help, guidance, _ Elias _ -

\- who sits at gate of every answer he needs - 

Useless bastard. He sits on the pretense of that untouchable throne, watching and plucking answers from all of them, but somehow unable to actually _ do _ anything with it. He’s useless and weak and just as human a monster as Jon is becoming. Jon had felt it, in that close space. Spooled within Elias are the same catacombs that every person brings with them to their statements. All their needs, wants, hopes, fears - tunnels so tightly wrapped, twisting veins that Jon wants to untangle, for threat of pain.

Elias dangles answers in front of him everyday, has always done so. And Jon pathetically gives himself to the hook every time. Now is no different. Some messy emotion painted over and over again by fear and uncertainty and paranoia. He can’t _ trust _ Elias, but Elias has answers. And Jon has never been able to keep himself from chasing that.

Every ugly thought is undercut by the same look Elias has given Jon since day one. Because in spite of everything,_ Elias _ trusts _ Jon _. 

It’s been evident from the moment they met, and blown open when Elias laid his hands on Jon. Nausea unsteadies him at the fact that it all comes back to that. The memory that’s practically tattooed on his cortex at this point. Without fail, it lights that previously oft-forgotten but now ever-present heat.

His hand snakes between his legs, and all he can think about is the pressure of Elias’s thigh there and waiting.

It’ll be quick, Jon tells himself. Done and over with, and hopefully half of this restlessness will go with it so that he can sleep. He repeats that to himself as he tugs the waistband of his pants just low enough to pull his cock out, half-hard already - of course, of course. It’ll be that much quicker. That’s all.

The few times he’s really had any desire to masturbate had been taken care of with methodical efficiency. It’ll be quick, and he’ll finally be able to sleep. It’ll be quick.

* * *

Statements draw Jon into another person in a way he has never been able to manage. No second guessing expressions, no misunderstanding emotional intent. There isn’t much to misunderstand in a statement.

Only one emotion matters.

It’s the emotion that sustains the patron of this godforsaken Institute, and, unfortunately, it’s the emotion that draws Jon in deepest.

The moment the encounter itself begins to be described, Jon feels something alight in him.

He hates it, despises himself for feeding something so cruel.

But something looms closer than the Watcher’s Crown, something that digs deep into Jon’s skin and needles at the isolation he’d buried himself in not too long ago.

(For that, he despises himself as well.)

His hands shake as he clicks off the tape recorder. Another useless statement. There’s no way he’ll be able to maintain this. He’s continued upping the amount he forces himself to read, all in the hopes that he’ll uncover _ something _ about the Unknowing.

Ironic, that.

But he’s too tired.

Elias still haunts each edge of each thought. Last night hadn’t been… productive in any sense of the word.

He doesn’t know what he expected anyways.

If anything, last night had been worse. The sick concoction of guilt, disgust, and loathing had kept him up for the rest of the night. Really, he should’ve known himself better. But whatever it is that Elias is doing is succeeding. His grip suffocates Jon, stops his breath until Jon opens his mouth to gasp for air, and then he’s left vulnerable for whatever Elias deigns to feed him.

Jon swallows.

He needs to speak with Elias.

He gets as far as standing up before his whole world is flooded by nausea and staticky bruises.

Exhaustion, he knows.

It takes a few moments for him to gather enough energy to stumble to the entrance of his own office. He can’t afford to take any longer, lest he wants to risk passing out where he stands.

He doesn’t remember half of the trip up to Elias’s door, but eventually he’s standing in front of the engraved plate that reads, “Head of the Magnus Institute.” It rests just above eye-level so that it stares down at him.

Fitting.

Prick.

He opens the door without knocking, barely remembering to close it as he steps inside.

"Hello, Jon," Elias says, maintaining eye contact with Jon as he walks quickly up to Elias’s desk.

Jon’s had enough of Elias’s crap.

“Whatever it is you’re doing, _ Elias_, I can’t _ do _ any of the research we need me to do like this.”

“I’m not doing anything. I’ve told you this.”

Neither of them budge. Elias sits ever like a portrait, staring up at Jon, who feels himself begin to shake with the pent-up frustration that last night had only worsened. He just wants an _ answer_, damn it. Just one clear answer.

“No,” Jon says. “I- I know you’re doing something.”

“Jon,” Elias says patronizingly, “You yourself insist that I never do anything.”

“Shut up.”

Elias doesn’t flinch.

“You have to be doing something. There’s no way I’d- ah-” Elias surely knows already, but Jon isn’t about to give him the satisfaction of admitting it out loud. 

Not that he has to actually say more. Jon’s clumsily tipped this over the edge, and Elias smiles at him like he’s won, all poised and Cheshire.

“I need the truth from you,” Jon says slowly.

“That’s all I’ve ever given you.”

It’s a blatant lie. They both know it.

“You’ve put something in my head. I can’t have- I wouldn’t have- Not if you hadn’t - done something.”

Elias knows. He’s too cheerful to _ not _ know.

Jon says, mostly to pull the topic a bit further away, “You watch me.” Another thing they both know.

“Occasionally, yes,” Elias acquiesces. “I’m going to be honest with you, Jon. I’ve been - aware - of your state. I have a vested interest in your well-being, and so I like to keep an eye on you, as, and I’m sure we can both agree on this, you have a penchant for getting yourself into trouble. But that’s all I’ve been doing. Watching. I have done nothing to influence your behavior nor your thoughts.”

He’s lying. That’s Jon’s first instinct. But he can’t ignore the strange sense of relief that washes over him. Like a statement recorded. All the facts of an incident come to the surface to be interred in the Eye’s well of knowledge. And it’s with a dawning horror that Jon realizes that Elias is telling the truth.

He doesn’t need to say it.

Elias stands up, taking off his jacket and hanging it neatly on the back of his chair. “All your emotions are your own.” He walks around to Jon’s side of the desk. Jon turns around to face him and immediately regrets it. Elias’s eyes bore into him. “I wouldn’t want to tamper with those, as flawed as they may be. I know your nature will eventually pull you in the direction you need to go.”

Elias’s hands come to rest on Jon’s hips, and Jon instinctively brings his own hands up to cover them.

“I know you finally acknowledged your feelings last night. And that you were unable to achieve orgasm until you fully gave in to those feelings.”

It feels worse like that, how detached Elias sounds despite being the root of all his problems. Elias isn’t wrong either. He hadn’t - he couldn’t, not until his thoughts had drifted inevitably back to Elias. He can’t even think about it right now without nearly crumbling under the weight of his own shame.

“So Jon, what is it that you want?” Elias asks, and though there is no god-given compulsion, it pulls at Jon all the same.

Jon can’t speak. There is too much he wants right now. Answers - he’d gotten those, but he needs more. Innumerable questions dangling in the air, the heaviest being Elias’s hands on him. A part of him screams at him to leave. To get out of here, lock himself in an endless cycle of exhaustion, smoke, drink, whatever it’d take to wait out this torment Elias has set up for him. That he’s fed, and continues to feed the longer he stands here.

He doesn’t speak, but he tightens his grip on Elias’s hands, unable to stop himself from pulling them towards his middle. Wordlessly urging Elias to move forward, give him the answer to this question that’s hung between them for the last two weeks.

Elias replies, sliding one hand up Jon’s middle and snaking it behind his head. He pulls Jon into a kiss that Jon breaks under. To taste Elias again, hear him and feel him - Jon has been starving for this. He moans haplessly into Elias’s mouth, and Elias is free to deepen the kiss. He’s free to do whatever he wants at this point, and Jon knows he’ll let him. 

Mouths get more desperate, until Jon’s taking and returning teeth and tongue, as Elias’s hands move to smoothly undo Jon’s belt and pants. That should piss Jon off. That Elias can do something like that.

It’s unfair, he thinks. But Elias has never played fair. Elias plays his game, and somehow, Jon always predictably plays, too. Even now, Jon has fallen into the same trap, which he can’t bother to mind, not with Elias’s hand wrapping around his dick. It’s all graceless pressure, but Jon needs only that at the moment. To know Elias is here, exposed as they both are. Jon’s quickly stroked to hardness, then Elias pulls back, looks deep into Jon with eyes of blown pupils and something like pride.

“Turn around,” Elias says, breathless and quiet.

Jon doesn’t think he’s ever heard Elias so uncomposed, and that fills him with an embarrassing giddiness that’s thankfully covered by, well - everything else happening at once.

He obeys Elias’s command. He feels small pressure between his shoulder blades, and he obeys that, too, leaning onto Elias’s desk with his forearms.

Elias tugs Jon’s pants down only as low as he needs to. Impatiently, a wettened finger presses against his hole, and it catches up to Jon how long Elias has probably been waiting for this, as well. Elias slides it in easily, soon replacing it with two fingers, scissoring him open. Three fingers, and Jon has to lay down into his arms to bite into the fabric of his shirt, though he’s sure Elias can still hear the muffled groans he gnaws into his arm.

Jon fears he might come apart like this, half of Elias’s hand thrusting into him, until Elias takes his hand away. He replaces it with his thumb and hooks Jon open, then there’s the slick insistence of a hot tongue, and Jon _ sobs_, one of his knees giving out on him. His heart is pounding in his chest, practically beating against the desk with how sharply he’s pressing himself onto it

_ Any second now_, he can - _ any second _ \- but, abruptly, knowingly, Elias leaves him cold and exposed.

There’s the clink of another belt clasp and the hiss of a zipper, and Jon doesn’t have the time to be disappointed before Elias is pressing his cock into Jon, opening him wider and more thoroughly than his fingers could have. It dredges a painful moan from deep within Jon’s chest, an overwrought support beam _ finally _ allowed to buckle under the mountain of pressure that’s been building - building - and _ finally _ he can break.

Elias grabs the collar of Jon’s shirt and uses that as the counterpoint to allow him to slam into Jon as roughly as they both need right now.

Day after day. Worse and worse. This aching need has been stacking upon itself. And it’s at this point, between them here, where Jon _ needs _ to know all that Elias wants to give him. All that Elias _ can _ give him.

His other knee weakens, but Elias’s hand is on him, keeping him up, for both of them.

Elias is quiet but for his breathing still, always as composed as _ he _ wants, though there are clear cracks in that composure, revealing everything that Jon has wanted in these weeks and more. To _ know _ that Elias is affected in a way that’s remotely akin to how Jon has been affected has Jon drunk with a bone-deep satisfaction. Elias - _ cold, distant, monster _ \- is here, dirty and careless and human as he takes Jon for himself. A rough messy affair that Jon can’t wrap his head around while his body is used to its capacity.

But he doesn’t need to think. For the first time in weeks, he can stop fighting his own head and let go, give in to exactly what Elias wants and let it be what he wants, too.

And it’s _ good _ like that. Like this.

Under Elias, incoherence fucked into him until he really can’t think even if he wanted, and he can only try to stand, teeth bruising his arm through his shirt, wet from his spit and cries. Elias has him teetered on the edge of pain, but he never gets to reach the other side of that balance. His orgasm hits him, steals his breath away so that he chokes on a moan.

Elias comes soon after, able to ride Jon through his orgasm as well as his own, filling Jon deep and hot, and it’s almost too much for Jon to take. Elias places his hands on either side of Jon, hips still completely flush with his, and they stay there like that. In this quiet aftermath, Jon can hear just how ragged Elias’s breathing had become. 

Jon removes his arms from under his head and lays listlessly, head emptied of all notions of will or emotion.

Eventually, they’ll have to move, and that has a ladder of consequences Jon doesn’t want to climb.

In a moment, though. He doesn’t have to think right now.


End file.
